Shirley, NY
How exposed is Shirley to wildfire?
USFS scores Shirley at the 55th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (modestly above the national average for wildfire risk), a figure built from 9,566 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Shirley's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 50th percentile nationally.
Shirley's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Shirley's buildings (58.3%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone. At 9,566 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Shirley compares
Shirley's 97th-percentile standing inside New York outpaces its 55th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Shirley ranks 14,251 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,702 by building count (1 is largest). Within New York alone, it ranks 36 of 1,289 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New York on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Shirley's elevated wildfire rating (55th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because 58.3% of Shirley's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
Where Shirley's figures come from
Shirley's 55th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Shirley's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.